As Tijuana's top cop, Leyzaola gained a reputation as a fierce, incorruptible enemy of drug cartels. Many credit him with restoring peace to the city following a period of fierce violence.

But he was also accused of abuses, going so far as to torture suspects to extract confessions. Indeed, the city attorney said she had substantiated a complaint from an ex-policeman who accused Leyzaola torturing him into confessing to a robbery.

Since leaving Tijuana, Leyzaola has been police chief of Ciudad Juarez, in the state of Chihuahua. He told a Tijuana newspaper that his eight-year ban from public office in Baja California doesn't bother him because his tenure in Tijuana produced results.